My thing about trains…

Big Yellow, B&O Museum in Baltimore, MD

I grew up in a small town in the middle of eastern South Dakota…pretty flat, not a lot there except wind. And trains. God, we had trains, big powerful monsters that huffed and puffed and oozed power. I’d ride my bike to the train station to watch them come in, screeching, puffing, hissing and then they’d stop. The conductors jumped down to place the steps and help the passengers down. Yep. “Back in the day” we had many passenger trains coming through Huron…the Chicago & Northwestern (CNW) Railroad was huge and a major reason the economy was stable and people could travel in the United States. Railroad barons seem to rule the world much like oil and tech barons in the coming centuries. But, oh baby, these monsters could take you almost anywhere…they were the magic of a small town boy marooned in 1950s post-WWII South Dakota isolation. I remember going with my dad to put mom and sister on a train headed for Minneapolis, Minneapolis…only a rumor to me.

Just a few hundred yards from where my first wife’s family lived was a HUGE roundhouse with a turntable…I think CNW had 40 “Stalls” there for cars or locomotives. I am not sure if it’s still in one piece, it’s probably been converted to something else. As the rail passenger business gave way to airlines, the railroads switched to primarily carrying meat from Huron to Omaha and Chicago. Armour Meat Packing had its own siding, the railroad would leave half a dozen cars in the morning, they’d get loaded during the day, sit all night (watchmen had to check the coolers), get picked up in the morning in exchange for a new set… Then Armours began to kill only hogs so large refrigerator cars stopping at the plant were no longer needed, and, it was expensive to maintain the siding and pay for the train gangs to drop off and pick up. In the new scheme, the meat would get loaded onto containers that were on Semi-trailer tractors backed up to the loading dock. The truckers would drive the containers to the train station where the containers were picked off the trucks and loaded onto specialized flatbed railcars. I think a man named Dick Payne ran the trucking company that did most of that work. Then Armours closed. CNW had closed years before. The rail is still there, I’m told and run by the DM&E.

So “Me and trains?” you ask. Well, I have a dream that trains will command a larger part of my life than they do now. In truth, I didn’t ride on a train until 1986. 1986!! Well, except the 1880 Train in Hill City, SD, when I was a little kid. No…trains went out of style in Huron. Then I moved to West Texas…nada. Then Iceland. Nothing. Then Florida…but I’d lost the bug. Back to Texas. Nothing for me. And then to Utah for four years…land of the Golden Spike. I was interested but it was way low on the “to do” list. Alabama. Minus nothing. Then to the D.C. area. Lots of trains!! And subways. I loved the subway…clickety, clackety, click! Perfect. And then I had a chance to go to England! My job was to convince the Brits they should buy the US AWACS instead of their own Nimrod. Off I went, staying in London for the most part, but journey north to the Nimrod base on a TRAIN!! At last! I was riding real trains for the first time. Seventh Heaven. I loved it. Oh…and the Brits bought the AWACS, it took 6 months to convince them but the trains made the time there so worthwhile. Meanwhile, back in DC, they found another job for me doing international support for the F-16 programs in Belgium, Holland, Denmark, and Norway. Oh, the trains in those countries. Awesome! They were all gorgeous and wonderful experiences…no matter how short. I think my favorite might have been the Oslo to Bergen line…over the glacier!!!

In the meantime, trains in the US are not flourishing. And…there’s always conflict about repairing or replacing or adding or almost anything. Which, I think is counterproductive. Figure out how to do this without hurting people or the world. But…the glory days of railroad in the 19th century were certainly not filled with glory. Railroad barons stole land in a variety of places and communities often gave up significant rights to convince the rail to stop at their community. It wasn’t a perfect system but it has good bones remaining. I wonder if an enhanced infrastructure of rails and pipelines is possible. Imagine water going from rain drenched pockets of the midwest to water-starved communities in New Mexico.

I made a quick four minute video of several years of train walkabouts in the greater DC area which includes DC, Northern Virginia, Richmond, Baltimore, and West Virginia. Click on by and leave a comment or subscribe.